Michael Swickard's new novel about New Mexico

From KRQE-TV.com - Investigative reporting - ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - When trash day arrives in one central Albuquerque neighborhood, residents have to remain on their toes.“I don’t want to get run over crossing the street,” said Tamara Righetini, a resident of the Country Club Neighborhood near downtown. “(It’s) really, really fast – like haulin’ butt through the neighborhood.” She’s talking about the driver of a 30-ton City of Albuquerque recycling truck, which News 13 tracked for a month. We caught him barreling down residential streets, ignoring traffic laws and endangering pedestrians, bicyclists and other drivers. For example, on May 25, our cameras recorded him turning the wrong way from Park Avenue onto Silver Avenue SE, a small one-way street. The driver could have legally made the turn just one block away. On June 1, we caught him swinging out wide into the on-coming traffic lane in order to make an illegal right turn from Alcalde Place SW on to San Patricio Avenue. No-right-hand turn signs clearly show his turn was not allowed. News 13 wanted to see what the driver had to say about his driving habits, so reporter Kim Holland caught up with him on his regular route through the neighborhood.“We’ve got you going the wrong way several times coming in on Alcalde,” Holland said. “How come you’re going the wrong way on the streets?” “You can call 3-1-1,” the driver said with a smile before driving away. That number is for citizens to register complaints with the city or ask questions. News 13 showed video of the violations to the driver’s boss, city solid waste director John Soladay. The majority of drivers for the city’s 175 trash trucks operate them safely, Soladay said. He said he receives a couple hundred complains per year about them, which is relatively few considering the seven million miles per year they drive. Still, a month after we brought our concerns to Soladay, the same driver remains on the same route. Read more

From the Santa Fe New Mexican.com - Commentary - Amid heated huddles over our nation's debt limit, and the obvious need to raise it this month before governmental credit and credibility go out the window, only now is the American public getting a hint of the pirate's chest lying there for the taking: Uncollected taxes — worth even more than the $400 billion congressional Democrats are demanding in tax increases. Between the complexities of our economy and the near-indecipherability of federal revenue laws, sharp accountants and tax attorneys can give their clients a subtle message: The odds of getting caught mingling personal and business income are long. The Obama administration wants a billion-dollar boost for IRS in the coming fiscal year, to bring 5,000 new agents on board. But Republicans dominating the House of Representatives and wielding filibuster power in the Senate are so anti-tax that they're declaring, in effect, more power to tax dodgers the bigger, the better. It's a classic case of politicians taking care of their friends. Americans who aren't pals with the pols, or who are honest and believe it is their duty to support their country, meanwhile, cough up extra money to cover those hundreds of billions of dollars that thieves — or, to be kind, call them mistake-makers — are getting away with. Wage earners and salaried workers pay 99 percent of their taxes; they can hardly avoid it, since taxes are withheld from their paychecks and their income is reported to the feds. But, says Pugh's Brookings source, those earning business income misreport more than half their actual income in the process of reporting deductions, credits and exemptions to which they're not entitled. In testimony before the Senate Finance Committee, businesspeople said some of their colleagues underreport income partly because the tax code's too complicated, and partly because the system is unfair. But it's not unfair to fudge? Mildly put, that's a fine how-d'ya-do. Read more

From weaselzippers - Office of Justice Programs: state and local law enforcement assistance . . For an additional amount for ‘State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance’, $90,000,000, to remain available until September 30, 20140,000,000, for competitive grants to provide assistance and equipment to local law enforcement along the Southern border and in High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas to combat criminal narcotics activity stemming from the Southern border, of which $10,000,000 shall be transferred to ‘Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Salaries and Expenses’ for the ATF Project Gunrunner. More News New Mexico

From directorblue-A document drop by LulzSec has revealed an ominous bulletin from police officials in Tucson, Arizona. In short, law enforcement is advised to be on the lookout for Hezbollah terrorists operating in the traditional smuggling corridors on our (wide-open) southern border with Mexico. Based on a study done by Georgetown University, the number of immigrants from Lebanon and Syria living in Mexico exceeds 200,000. Along with Iran, Syria is one of Hezbollah’s strongest financial and political supporters, and Lebanon is its country of origin. More News New Mexico

Washington, DC (July 7, 2011) Today, Congressman Steve Pearce addressed the need to face the national debt without tax increases, which will kill jobs. “The president wants to tax the buyers of corporate jets to balance the budget,” said Pearce. “When he raises taxes on corporate jets, fewer corporate jets will be bought, fewer jets will be built, fewer workers are needed to build jets. Tax increases kill jobs.” Tax increases will not balance the budget. In fact, CNN’s Brianna Keilar reported recently that tax increases—the ones the President claimed would affect only millionaires and billionaires—would in fact target Americans making far less.

The same report pointed out that the President’s proposed tax increases on corporate jet owners—which he mentioned six times in a recent address—would only bring in about $3 billion over 10 years, “a drop in the bucket” compared to the trillions we need to save. Meanwhile, taxes like this one will hurt businesses and kill jobs across America. Clearly, the tax increases proposed by the White House are not serious solutions to high unemployment and a staggering national debt. “We are spending $3.5 trillion for every $2.2 we take in,” Pearce explained. “You cannot tax enough to make up that difference. Tax increases will kill jobs, cripple our economy even further, and drive us deeper into debt.

Any increase in our debt limit must be accompanied by a plan that includes spending cuts and solutions to the fraud and waste that run rampant in Washington. Most importantly, we must ease the tax and regulatory burdens that are crushing our small businesses and killing jobs. Allowing our small business owners to create jobs is the only way to fix America’s debt problem.” At town hall meetings last Saturday, Congressman Pearce was applauded when he emphasized the importance of job growth, and promised not to vote for a debt ceiling extension without a plan to end the national debt. Numerous constituents have contacted Rep. Pearce in support of this promise. Congressman Pearce has consistently argued that job growth—his top priority in Congress—will both reduce spending and increase revenues, and is the only true solution to the national debt.